Overview

• The Court of Appeal of Rome on July 14 confirmed one-year-six-month and one-year-two-month sentences for Francesco Bidognetti and Michele Santonastaso, upholding their 2021 convictions for public threats.
• Judges determined that the 2008 public reading of a Camorra declaration during the Spartacus trial was a deliberate tactic to intimidate Roberto Saviano and fellow journalist Rosaria Capacchione.
• Saviano, under police protection since 2006 after publishing Gomorra, hailed the verdict as the most important of his life following a fifteen-year legal struggle.
• The National Federation of the Italian Press and the Order of Journalists joined as civil parties to defend press freedom and challenge organized-crime intimidation.
• With the appeal decision issued, the case now faces a possible review by the Court of Cassation, underscoring the lengthy pace of mafia-related justice in Italy.